It is well known that in recent years casinos for the play of legalized gambling games, including card games, have become increasingly common. One of the most popular of these games is blackjack, on which enormous sums are wagered daily in casinos. Blackjack is a relatively simple game in which each player including the dealer is dealt two or more cards, the object being to take additional cards as necessary until the sum of the cards is 21 or less. However, the play is complicated by the typical casino arrangement for gambling at blackjack, which requires up to seven players be dealt to by a single dealer. Moreover, there are various possibilities for complex betting arrangements and for modification of the play which render the dealer's task relatively complex with increasing chance of dealer error. Obviously, as the dealer's shift progresses he or she is likely to grow increasingly tired and make further errors.
For all those reasons, it is desirable that apparatus be available for monitoring the play at blackjack and for alerting the dealer if he or she has made an error, for example. It is also desirable that the casino have a means to ensure that no opportunity for cheating of the casino exists, e.g., by collusion between a dealer and a player.
Another factor of relevance is that "card counters" have become increasingly prevalent is casinos. Card counters are persons who follow the play so as to know whether the cards remaining in the deck or decks from which the dealer is dealing include a greater or lesser number of high or low cards, which would alter the odds of any given card being drawn, and hence altering the strategy of play. It is well understood that such card counters can have a significant advantage over the casino. However, most dealers are unable to carry out their ordinary functions of dealing, monitoring the play of the individual cards, and perform the card counting function as well, so that they are unable to determine when a card counter would have an advantage and cannot be expected to know when the casino's interests would best be served by discarding the deck(s) and starting with fresh cards. Accordingly, it is desirable that an automatic apparatus be available to determine whether a particularly high number of high or low cards have been played in any given sequence so as to determine whether an opportunity for successful card counting exists.
From the above, it will be apparent that there exists a need for apparatus for monitoring the play of gambling games, particularly blackjack.
Such an apparatus to be successful would desirably have the following additional attributes. It would be useful without requiring any input from the dealer so as not to further complicate his work or task. It would operate entirely automatically without operator intervention and without modification to the complex rules and customs of the game as previously practiced. It would desirably provide a printed report on the play of the game. Finally, it would sound an alarm if any of the conditions mentioned above as desirable for detection occurred, e.g., cheating of or by a dealer, error of a dealer, or the existence of conditions which would favor card counters.